Issues dominate in Illinois gubernatorial race, but so does money

This past Tuesday night was the latest round of the Illinois Democratic gubernatorial candidates forum; this one sponsored by NBC-Ch. 5, The Urban League, the Union League Club of Chicago, and Telemundo; and in a brisk pace, local media doyenne, Carol Marin teased out their positions for those that may have missed an earlier forum that was sponsored by the local DCC, on the city’s far North Side, and two sponsored by a duo of local women’s organizations: Chicago Women Take Action Alliance, and She Votes Illinois; plus one by the state’s LGBTQ community, all of which helped solidify the various positions that the candidates have established. 

On stage were billionaire J.B. Pritzker, businessman Chris Kennedy, community activist, Tio Hardiman, former teacher Dan Biss and educator, Bob Daiber, and veteran candidate Robert Marshall - all of whom were forced at points to give specific answers to specific question, and at time, some like Hardiman attempted to grandstand without being specific, often frustrating Marin in her attempt to move the hour along. 

Case in point is the state’s tax system -- one of the least progressive in the tri-state area and that has been debated, and pilloried by many for several years. As the Chicago Tribune reported: “All of the candidates except Marshall favor replacing the state’s current 4.95 percent personal income-tax rate, which Democratic and Republican lawmakers raised last summer, with a graduated tax that would place a higher levy on higher incomes akin to the federal system. 

The change, which would require a voter-approved constitutional amendment, couldn’t be considered for at least two years. Pritzker, Biss and Kennedy declined to specify the highest tax rate they would support on those making the most money, but Pritzker and Kennedy each said Illinois should adopt changes to the state’s tax code to grant additional tax credits to help the middle class until a graduated tax could be considered.” Opinions varied with Biss feeling that the change would hurt the middle class, but that it was endemic to do the right thing, for all taxpayers; with Daiber saying that any changes in revenue and budget should help fund schools in the state, and, says the longtime educator, that a quality education was vital for the future of the state’s economic viability. 

The elephant in the room was still the current occupant of the governor's chair, Republican Bruce Rauner, whose stalemate over a budget agreement with the state assembly crippled the budgets of local colleges and universities, and social service agencies, as he hammered out his insistence on what was a partisan and union bashing position, foreign to this blue state. The old adage that money can’t buy you love, but it can get you into political office is being tested in the Land of Lincoln and it came out in full force that evening. 

For many, the leading candidate is Pritzker, worth nearly $4 billion dollars, and in a race where many say will be won by only a wealthy man; Rauner spent $28 million of his own dollars getting elected, and hired an unprecedented 400 staff members to ease that win, has set the gold standard in the 2014 reign. Pritzker’s people won’t say how much that he intends to spend, from his own pocket, but it’s an easy assumption that the Hyatt Hotel heir will spend what the thinks that he needs, should he win the primary. Some Democrat party leaders, such as Sen. Dick Durbin and Congresswoman Tammy Duckworth, have given their prestigious endorsement to him, and that only increases the amount that can be raised and matched. 

Those involved in the gubernatorial battle describe the spending as an arms race, pitting two free-spending billionaires willing to invest whatever it takes, said Politico.com, shortly after the Pritzker candidacy was announced. “I’ve never in my career started a race with an opponent sitting on $70 million at the outset,” said Pritzker campaign manager Anne Caprara, who served as executive director of Priorities USA, the pro-Hillary Clinton super PAC. “That is new, I will say.” “

Pritzker is widely regarded as the front-runner ahead of the March 20 primary election, benefiting from pouring more than $42 million of his fortune into extensive TV advertising and building up his campaign while the Democratic establishment has coalesced around his candidacy.” Others breakdown that Rauner spent $68 million campaign dollars with the $28 million of his own money, and can go higher much higher for his reelection bid. And the entire race may hit $300 million in total, setting a national record, for the fifth most populous state in the country. “That has left Kennedy and Biss running as outsiders and trying to emerge as Pritzker’s top rival in hopes of shaping public perception that the contest is down to two candidates,”continued the Tribune. 

Rauner is still, for this mostly liberal state, is continuing to look like Scrooge, especially with the nearly two year stretch, where the state lacked a budget, under his stalemate, only to have one that was finally approved over his veto. 

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His recent amendatory veto of a major education funding bill (which gave parity for low income children),and was passed again, over his objections as “just a bailout for Chicago,” but which he much later cheerfully signed - is the one to beat, say all of the men on the stage. Supporting an unheralded $75 million voucher program for a state that still struggles to meet state constitution mandated pension tabs, is one area, of opposition, and one that had the support of the Chicago Roman Catholic Cardinal Blase Cupich, who recently closed five Catholic schools for reasons of economy but now plans to build a multi million dollar complex on land across the street from Holy Name Cathedral, tainting all involved with hypocrisy, say some, who scoff at the reasons for the closings. 

The governor also received the dubious distinction from the National Review, the de facto Republican Party house organ, that claimed Rauner was the worst Republican governor in the nation. Being in the opposition means more than bashing and the need for building that better mousetrap, and hearing how it would be made seemed to be the goal of the evening and Marin’s questions were targeted to elicit a response. 

Coming out swinging was Kennedy, the scion of the storied political family, whose trailing poll numbers have caused worries among his supporters, sparked when “Biss [who] is the only supporter of a financial transaction tax, known as the “LaSalle Street tax,” on individual transactions in Chicago’s financial and commodity exchanges. Such a tax, he said, could generate up to $8 billion. But the transactions tax, long supported by the Chicago Teachers Union, is viewed as unlikely in an era of digitized trading in which exchanges could leave Chicago. The comment prompted a rebuke from Kennedy, who suggested Biss was trying to “promise something we can’t deliver.” 

Yet delivering on improving educational opportunities for all, is another item on the new governor's short list, whoever that may be, as graduation rates from Illinois’ public colleges has improved from a low of 73.1 percent - in the traditional four years -- to 88.30 percent in 2016.

If the state’s economic drivers are to be sustained in a new era that demands, as employers continue to search for qualified employees. Previously, economists have claimed that 64 percent of jobs in the state will require post-secondary education this year. 

Hovering in the background are traditional “pay to play” politics and Rauner recently ran ads revealing Pritzker in a seemingly assent to be made attorney general in the now infamous Blagojevich tapes; a charge that he has denied; and which he answered in what some are calling a “dodgy” manner. 

When Marin asked Kennedy to say something nice about Pritzker, he replied that he was a “poster child of all that’s wrong with the corrupt system in our state.” “It’s difficult for me to heap praise on him. And that’s where I unfortunately need to end it,” Kennedy said. The remark was a breach of debate protocol — even Hillary Clinton was able to muster up praise for Donald Trump’s children in an October 2016 presidential debate — and afterward, Kennedy said he apologized to Pritzker.” 

Biss, who like Kennedy, has gone after Pritzker as being a typical Illinois politician with the tacit suggestion, that his loyalties are divided and that his a strong supporter for longtime Speaker of the House MIchael Madigan continuing a fight that began at the Chicago Women Take Action Alliance forum, “ . ..when unexpectedly, in an offhand remark about Speaker of the House Michael Madigan, and that Pritzker was his favored candidate, to which he replied, “That’s hypocrisy, if you want to see the man that voted for Madigan, look at the end of the table!” 

 On Tuesday, this was the scenario: “The best thing for (Rauner) in this election is to run against another billionaire who’s Mike Madigan’s candidate,” Biss said. “If we want to be successful, we can’t afford to do that. And so I think it’s important to nominate someone with a record of standing up to Mike Madigan.” Pritzker responded that Biss was “the only candidate on this stage that voted for Mike Madigan for speaker of the House, that ran Mike Madigan’s super (political action committee) in 2016, and you’ve accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from Springfield insiders and bankers and lobbyists.” “So I don’t think you’re the one to lecture here,” Pritzker said to Biss. “I think you should just be who you are and stop criticizing others.” 

“Biss served in in the House for one term and backed Madigan for speaker before moving to the Senate. In 2016, Madigan's personal campaign fund gave $500,000 to Leading Illinois for Tomorrow, a federal PAC Biss ran that made about $10 million in independent expenditures, mainly for TV ads seeking to link Rauner to then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump,” said the Tribune.

With some issues at the forefront, especially economic ones, the standard “gotcha” of Illinois politicians is in the background, and does not seem like it’s going away. Stay tuned.